Late Again
by Ebona Nite
Summary: Kakashi oneshot. Ever wondered how Kakashi comes up with those excuses? What if he wasn't lying?


**Late Again**

A Kakashi one-shot by Ebona Nite

_November 16, 2006_

**_Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or any of these characters._**

"talking"

_thinking

* * *

_

The silver-haired jounin, Hatake Kakashi, was known as many things: teacher of genin Team 7, ex-ANBU member, Sharingan no Kakashi or the Copy-Cat Nin, pervert, orange-book Kakashi, fan of Icha Icha Paradise. But mostly, especially to his team, he was known as He-Who-Will-Be-Late-To-His-Own-Funeral.

"Yo!' the jounin called as he jogged up to the bridge.

"YOU'RE LATE!!!" Naruto and Sakura screamed in stereo.

_Let's see, I told them about the cat in the tree yesterday, the old lady crossing the street the day before, saving the fish the day before that, what should I say today? I suppose the tried-and-true one will work as good as any. _"Sorry, I was lost on the road of life." Kakashi announced happily.

"LIAR!" two of his students hollered. Sasuke just went "Hn." But managed to look even more contemptuous than usual.

Kakashi had to wonder how something as metaphysical as a road of life could be deemed a lie. _Isn't it the point of metaphors that they aren't literal?

* * *

_

_**The next morning…**_

Kakashi stood before the Memorial Stone, staring at the names of ninjas fallen in battle. At one name in particular. _Uchiha Obito_. His old team-mate. Would Sasuke end up like that? Would Naruto? Sakura? Or would they all pull through?

With a sigh, the silver-haired jounin's single uncovered eye glanced down at his watch. _Better get going, I have ten minutes before I told them to be there. Maybe I can manage not to be late today._

Kakashi walked briskly (yes briskly, you unbelievers) down the road towards the training grounds. A pitiful mewling caught his attention, and then a little girl caught his hand.

"Hey mister, my kitten got stuck up that tree. Can you get her down please?"

Kakashi looked down at the girl, wearing a yellow dress with matching ribbons in her pig-tails, then up at the tree where sure enough, a brown and grey kitten was crouched in the upper branches. "Alright, hang on." He jumped up on a lower branch and slowly made his way towards the kitten, knowing from much experience with the daimyo's wife's cat getting lost that you never want to approach an upset feline too quickly. They tended to claw when stressed, as Naruto was apt to repeatedly prove. Gently picking up the kitten, he jumped down again and handed it to its owner.

"Thanks!"

"Be careful not to let it out without watching the poor thing." He told her, "Or it might climb trees again." It didn't matter how many times he told the little girl, the kitten was in the tree every morning, without fail. It was like the daimyo's wife's cat in a way. _Maybe I should propose it as a new D-rank mission to the Hokage._

One block up, there was that little old lady again. Really, the woman was in her eighties and had children and grandchildren. Why did she insist on going to the store on her own every morning?

"Ma'am do you need any assistance?" Kakashi asked politely. She was having trouble getting down over the curb with her walker again.

"Well aren't you a nice young man! Yes please, just hold my purse will you? I'll be down in a tick." Kakashi took hold of her purse and watched her nearly fall over the curb. He caught her and set her on her feet in the street, and uprighted her walker. Then he shuffled next to her slowly, as she – very slowly – shuffled along with her walker across the street, making sure traffic went around her without cursing the poor old woman for being so slow. Finally – fifteen minutes later, and he realized he was late again – they made it to the other side of the road and he helped her up over the curb and handed her her purse.

Jogging now, her made it two blocks farther before the next obstacle confronted him.

The perpetually late jounin turned at a tap on his shoulder, and saw a red-faced Ebisu, breathing heavily. Obviously he'd been running around a lot already this morning, probably after the Sandaime's grandson again.

"H-hello Kakashi. Have you seen Konohamaru this morning?"

"No, but the square rock with eyeholes went that way."

"Thank you. Young master come back! You really must go to school!" Ebisu ran off in the direction Kakashi pointed. Kakashi rolled his eyes and gave a thumbs-up to the potted plant next to the alley-way. It rustled happily at him and moved in the opposite direction. Konohamaru and his friends were getting slightly better at disguises after spending so much time with Naruto; however, they'd probably be caught before too long – not many people had potted plants on their front walks and there were only so many houses down the street.

By this time, the jounin was over twenty minutes late. Actually, for his record, he might get there "early" today. Only twenty minutes –

"MY FISH ARE DYING! SOMEONE HELP!" Nevermind. It was fish-boy again. His karma wasn't letting up today. Kakashi briefly wondered what he'd done in a previous life to deserve these odd people. Maybe he should take a new morning route.

"The point of having a koi pond in your yard, is to keep koi in it. Not to keep koi on the lawn." Kakashi lectured the boy as he ran around catching the flopping fish and dumping them back in the pond. He got slapped on the face several times with their tails. "How do you keep managing to get them all out anyway?"

"I'm practicing my speed! I'm gonna be able to punch really fast after I can get all the fish out without getting my hands wet! Only I kinda missed the bucket I was supposed to put them in."

Kakashi eyed the pail of water, barely big enough to fit a single large koi much less the eight that were in the pond (or on the lawn depending on the morning), and thought it was no wonder. "You need a larger pail I think." Is all that he said. The kid must read too much _Ranma 12 _manga.

_What's next?_ Kakashi wondered, glancing at his watch. The episode with the fish had taken another twenty minutes, and if nothing else bothered him this morning he'd only be an hour late.

At this point, Kakashi just meandered along the road instead of briskly walking or jogging. He was already late, never mind that it wasn't as late as he usually was, so there was really no point in hurrying anymore. _It wouldn't make much difference. Especially since all the crazy people seemed to be out this morning._

"Toby! Toby! Come back!" _Speak of the devil._ Kakashi jumped into a tree, narrowly missing getting impaled on the horns of a bull rushing past, a man screaming after it on its tail. People begain screaming and racing off the street into homes, whether or not the homes belonged to them.

Kakashi jumped down and joined the impromptu running of the bulls – er, bull. "So Mr. Farswit, what brings you and Toby so far into town again today?"

"Toby escaped his pastures again!"

"Yes, I can see that." Kakashi had to use the Body Flicker technique to get in front of the bull, grab the little old lady with her walker and bag of groceries, and Body Flicker her off the street. He'd come back later to help her pick up her groceries, and probably he'd end up helping her slowly back across the street.

The silver-haired man may have been a jounin, but the bull had been running from farmers and ninjas alike for a couple years now, and it wasn't until the huge brown steer had threaded through street after street before finally stopping at the Yamanaka's flower shop to eat their lilies, three quarters of an hour later, that he was able to catch up.

After making sure Mr. Farswit tied up the bull, paid Ino's parents for the lilies and bought some more to lure Toby back to the ranch with, and headed on his way, Kakashi was able to head back for the bridge. He was further up the street than he'd started, he noticed. _One step forward and two steps back._ He chanted to himself.

He was right about the old lady, he found. She was still going about picking up her groceries, and dropping more each time she bent over. And the rest of the people on the street were still too shook up over the bull to help her themselves. _You think they'd be used to it by now._ He mused.

After spending fifteen minutes picking up groceries and trying to get her to stop bending over and dropping more, and then twenty minutes shuttling her across the street at a snail's pace while directing traffic around her, Kakashi was able to get a move-on again.

* * *

More than two hours after he was supposed to be there, Kakashi finally made it to the bridge. Still, that was a bit better than some days.

"YOUR'RE LATE!!!" Naruto and Sakura screamed.

"Well you see…" the silver haired jounin began, and then paused in thought. "Never mind, you wouldn't believe me anyway."

"LIAR!" shrieked the two, purely out of habit. Kakashi shrugged. They'd been through the routine so long that they no longer listened to Kakashi's "excuses"; he figured he wouldn't correct them. He'd only get loudly accused of lying again.

* * *

**END**


End file.
